A federal appeals court has dealt EPA a double-barreled defeat in legal challenges to the agency’s imposition of a “good neighbor” smog control plan last year on Kentucky.
In an opinion issued Friday afternoon, a three-judge panel for the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down EPA’s earlier disapproval of the state plan that was the prerequisite to Kentucky’s inclusion in the federal counterpart.
The panel also found that the Cincinnati-based 6th Circuit was the proper venue for hearing the ensuing litigation brought by the state. EPA had argued that the case belonged before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on the grounds that it related to nationally applicable regulations.
But in the ruling, Judge Eric Murphy found that EPA’s rejection of Kentucky’s plan last year was a quintessentially local matter. He also concluded that the disapproval violated the Administrative Procedure Act because of EPA’s handling of the air pollution modeling that underlay that decision.
